


A Gift from Zatanna

by reddawnrumble



Category: Smallville
Genre: F/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-22
Updated: 2012-10-22
Packaged: 2017-11-16 20:05:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/543329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reddawnrumble/pseuds/reddawnrumble
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zatanna bestows Clark a magical gift that allows him to bring his happiest memories of his friends and family into a single plain of existence for one night. There's a catch; will Clark find something to bring him back home before his time runs out? Pure fluff, love, and creative liberties taken. Hints of every pairing that was ever canon and then some.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Gift from Zatanna

The crystal is a gift, or so says Zatanna when she gives it to him.

            It holds a very special ability, she tells him. If properly used, it will create a trance-like state in which he will be able to recall all those most important to him, to bring them together in a single thread of consciousness for a single span of time. Only those he’s seen in person, though, she warns him. Just those who have personally touched his life, and whose lives have been touched in return.

            It’s has just one life cycle, but that will last as long as he wants it to. There’s one catch, she waves the black gem under his nose. One catch. The longer he bears up under the trance, the more difficult he will find it to return to reality. Stay too long, and he’ll be trapped in that moment until his waking body perishes.

            Clark Kent only debates for a heartbeat; then he takes the deal.

            He sits on the edge of his bed that night long after Lois has gone to sleep. Her wedding ring shines brightly on her finger, bright against the pillow. It’s not, Clark reasons, that he’s unhappy where he is. But he wants a taste of everything he’s lost. He wants to taste high school again, Crater Lake’s water, smell fertilizer and his mom’s bakewares and feel the Kansas sun as bright as it always felt in those days when he thought he had everything. He wants wholeness again, and even if he’s happy now he knows there are pieces missing that he’ll never get back.

            He falls asleep that night flat on his back with that gemstone clutched to his chest.

            That night, Clark Kent dreams.

            He’s never in one definable place at first, he’s in all the places at once. He’s thumping Oliver on the back in his penthouse, he’s sweeping Chloe off her feet in a hug in the bullpen of the Daily Planet. He turns and throws a hoop shot that Pete Ross blocks, but when Pete throws it back it’s a football nailing him from Whitney Fordman’s strong throwing arm.

            Clark goes deeper.

            He finds Lana in the loft, curly mocha hair and warm eyes the way she left him, and he waits for a taste of Kryptonite on his tongue that never comes. When he hugs her, it reels with lost time and _what could have been_ , a friendship laid to ruin, lost love laid to rest. He whispers, “Are you okay?” and he doesn’t mean here. He means _out there_ , he means in the world that seems so cold compared to the warm haven he’s in right now.

            “Better than okay,” she assures him, and she kisses his cheek, sliding her hand down the warm trail it leaves, moving past him. When he turns, she’s gone, and Kara’s in her place. Kara with her arms around him, Kara smelling like clean laundry and open air and that faint tang of _home_ , of Krypton that’s never left her skin.

            Suddenly it’s Christmas, suddenly it’s downstairs in a farmhouse full of people who have never met, or whose lives crossed, a long time ago. Clark sees Pete and Chloe pouring over old photographs by the fireplace, while Whitney and Lana slow-dance like they’re children again.

No one here has been a child for a long time, but Clark doesn’t complain.

Tess is helping Martha bake, and Clark goes into the kitchen and slings an arm around both their waists and swings them away from the stove, grinning when they squeal, ducking when they both go to cuff his head. A hand lands on his shoulder, a cryptic voice murmuring, “Looks like you’re the life of the party as usual, Clark.”

Clark turns, with the pitch and yaw of old wounds when he sees Lex standing in the middle of his kitchen with a glass of cider in one hand and the other stuffed into the pocket of his dark overcoat. There’s something young and innocent in his face, younger still when he splits into a broad grin and holds up his free arm, welcoming, inviting. They embrace, time turning back the clock, and of course Lex is a part of this—whatever it is. Whatever Zatanna gave him in the form of a sleek black stone.

Oliver and Victor hang decorations and the house smells like cookies and chocolate, and Lana’s dancing with Lex now and Whitney’s asked Chloe for a dance, and Clark feels so full he could burst. Because this, here, this is all he’s ever wanted.

He ruffles Ryan’s hair where he’s sitting on the couch reading Warrior Angel comics that Connor keeps trying to filch off of him. Kyla and Professor Willowbrook face-paint Henry Small’s two young children. Henry James Olson and his younger brother Jimmy wrestle on the floor until Chloe comes running in from nowhere and tackles them and plants a wet kiss right on Henry’s cheek, and Jimmy mimes gagging and Clark almost trips over all three of them on his way into the entry hall.

Ethan’s just coming in, with Lionel on his heels shaking off the cold. There’s handshakes and backslaps and even though these are people who hurt him, even though they betrayed him sometimes and he knows it, he _knows_ it, Clark can’t stop that part of him who believes in the good in everyone, the place where this dream is born.

Clark stands by the open front door, staring out into the wintery bluster, the outdoor lights throwing gleams of gold and stripes of satin-yellow over everything, and he’s pretty sure he’s about to choke on the happiness welling up in his throat. Right now, his worlds are colliding, all the missing years knit together; finally his high-school friends can meet his cousin, and Lex and Lana can exist in the same world without killing each other, and Tess and Lex can share private, joking smiles across the room. Finally Clark has everything he wants, all in the same place. He doesn’t know how he’ll leave.

There are still people he has to find.

Clark turns and runs, back into the living room where everyone’s starting to gather, and he pushes and glides and elbows between friends and family until he finds Jonathan, and all but tackles him into a bear hug. Jonathan turns around and his arms wrap around Clark like Clark is still scared and fifteen, not grown up, not quite a man. They stand there in a safe place of their own amidst dozens of bodies, and when they let go Jonathan takes Clark’s face in his hands, kisses the top of his head.

“Always knew if anyone could bring everyone together, it was you, son.”

To Clark, lights have never shined brighter and food has never tasted better than when they’re all sitting informally on the floor with plates of ham and turkey and potatoes, but something’s missing. It takes him a little while to place it, sitting with one hip pressed against Jonathan’s and the other against Lana’s, but then he looks up and sees her in the doorway and his heart actually, he swears, skips a beat.

It’s not often Lois Kent looks uncertain, but right then she does, standing there in her orange cocktail dress with one hand on the doorpost. Her eyes zero in on him, and it’s nothing, nothing at all for Clark to set his plate down and get up to meet her, to swing her around in the kind of heroic kiss she’d tease him for any other day of the week. He kisses her until Ryan protests and Lex says he’d better come up for air or take her upstairs. Martha swats him, everyone laughs, Clark breaks away and leads her over to the others. Lois hugs Lana, hugs Martha, hugs Jonathan.

“Dad, I, uh. Say hello to my wife.” He scratches the back of his neck and smiles sheepishly. Jonathan looks between them.

Then he looks at Martha and says, “You owe me five dollars, sweetheart.”

Clark can’t believe his dad actually made a bet on it, but then he was betting on it, too. So maybe it all runs in the family.

They stay, they eat, they dance and the night’s endless. The Christmas tree winks in the corner like it knows every secret, Clark’s included, but here secrets don’t matter. Lana falls asleep with her head on Whitney’s shoulder and Chloe stretches out against Pete, her feet on Henry’s lap. Oliver’s never far away, but he’s the one reading comics now while Ryan and Connor try to see who can stuff more marshmallows into their hot chocolate. Tess watches, sitting beside Emil with their shoulders scarcely brushing.

Clark and Lex stand by the sink; they drink cups of cider and watch Jonathan and Martha gravitate toward each other, Lois and Lucy squabbling over a game of dominoes. Bart tries to finagle Arthur and Mira by playing invented words in Scrabble and Dinah stops it from becoming a fight. There’s more, people upstairs, people downstairs, Clark feels like they’re all under his skin. Carter and Courtney and Bruce and Barbara, friends old and new. John Jones and Virgil Swann. Clark’s grandfather. Faora.

 Presently, he realizes he’s overwhelmed. He’d never really thought about just how many people he held this close to his heart.

“Moving on is never easy,” Lex says, sagely. “But the people we love don’t really leave us completely, Clark. They live on inside us, even if we refuse to see them.”

“I know.”

Lex drinks. “And you know you have to go.”

“I don’t want to. I could stay longer. I don’t want this night to end.”

Jonathan joins them. “None of us ever does, son. But there are people who are a part of your past, and people who will shape your future. I think you know which ones you need right now.”

“It’s hard. It’s so hard doing this without all of you.”

“We’re still here, pal.” Lex nudges him. “Always will be. You just have to know where to look.”

Clark’s eyes settle on Lois, moving toward him through the crowd. She stretches out her hand with a lopsided smirk. “Come on, Smallville. The real world’s still waiting. Let’s go home.”

Clark looks at Jonathan, taking in his nod of affirmation. They grip each other tight in one last, lingering hug; a backslap from Lex, a nod from Whitney, a handshake from Pete. One last kiss on the cheek from Lana. An enthusiastic farewell from the Olsons. Goodbyes follow them out into the night, Kara’s hug and Lionel’s wink the last to see them out.

Hand-in-hand, they cross a yard white with snow. Clark’s heart aches, but he keeps going: one foot in front of the other.

Lois stops them in front of the barn, faces Clark, takes both his hands in hers. “You ready?”

Clark looks back at the house.

            In the morning, he will wake up and Jonathan will still be dead and Tess will still be dead and Henry James Olson will still be dead. Kara will still be missing and Lana will still be gone from his life forever. Lex’s memories will still be wiped and Pete will still be gone and Whitney Fordman will still be a martyr for his country. There will be names on gravestones and names on old love letters and names scrawled on the backs of pictures. Names of friends who will never meet again, names of family who’ve gone on, names whispered into pillows and skin. Smallville, Kal-El, Clark Kent, Superman, son, sweetheart, baby. A little bit Naman, a little bit Warrior Angel, a hero, a blur, a son of Krypton and a man of earth. He’s been all of them.

            “Hey.” Lois lays a hand on his cheek, turning his eyes toward her. “You with me, Smallville?”

            In the morning, he will wake up and there will still be Lois. And abruptly, warming him to the core, Clark realizes that that’s enough. It’s more than enough.

            He squeezes her hands. “I’m ready.”

            “Then what are you waiting for? Fly me home, Superman.”

            He wraps an arm around her, and they’re soaring.

            He wakes up, minutes later, or hours later, he’s not sure. It’s morning, he’s in bed. The dull ebony rock lays on the hollow of his sternum, its magic fully exerted. It’s nothing but a paperweight now.

            Beside Clark, he feels the sheets rumple. There’s a grunt, a yawn. Lois flips over and looks at him with a smile. “Well, don’t you look cheerful. Have any good dreams?”

            “You bet.” Clark brushes her tangled hair from her brow with the back of his hand. “Waking up to you is better.”

            “Going soft on me, Smallville?”

            “Not even possible. Man of Steel, remember?”

            “Mmm,” Lois kisses him lightly on the lips, something that calms him and warms him somehow at the same time. “You’ll always be Clark Kent to me.”

            To Clark Kent, that’s fine, that’s just fine.

            Looking ahead, he pushes the stone to the floor, and pulls Lois into his arms.

            Always looking ahead.                      

            There’s a warm smell of cookies and chocolate on the air. 

 


End file.
